Perspectives on the Origin of Indian Civilization

Contents: Preface. Introduction. 1. Some remarks on the origin and development of Indian language and linguistic area/Girish Nath Jha. 2. Rgveda all inclusiveness/N. Kazanas. 3. Some unlikely tentacles of early Indo-European/Koenraad Elst. 4. The origin of Indian civilization: critical analysis of the contribution of linguistics/Angela Marcantonio. 5. Rgveda: its chronology on the basis of astronomical references/B.N. Narahari Achar. 6. Oral tradition in Indian civilization/M.G. Prasad. 7. Dialectics of power and civilization: knowledge centered Indian civilization/R.P. Singh. 8. South Asian archaeology: late prehistoric cultural continuity or discontinuity/Jim G. Shaffer and Diane A. Lichtenstein. The earliest Indian inscriptions date from the third century before Christ. Archaeological and palaeo-anthropological evidence, as well as the Indian oral tradition, consistently point to the continuity of the Indian civilization back to a much earlier date. However the question of the origin of Indian civilization prior to that period remains open. There are three main schools of thought in this regard. Proponents of the Indo-European theory suggest that the Sanskrit language and civilization were an intrusion into Indian from the West. Proponents of the continuity theory on the contrary, believe that they arose locally. The third school of thought proposes that the current scholarship is insufficient to trace the Sanskrit language and civilization back to pre-historical times, and that further research is required to develop a fair comparison between the European languages and the Indian languages. Published literature in the field often reflects one or the other of these perspectives rather than offering an integrated view.…